Colm Keaveney (Galway East, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I acknowledge the dedication, commitment and, above all, action of the Minister of State, Deputy Gerald Nash, in filling an incredibly complex gap that existed in the economy. It has been challenging for many people as vividly described by many Deputies in the House today. I appeal to people in the Chamber to support the legislation on the basis that within the context of the constitutional challenges, achieving the utopian aspirations of some was never going to happen with Fine Gael in government. That is the reality. Deputy Catherine Murphy described the conflict between the worker and the employer. It is in the Constitution, in fact. The relationship is that of master and servant. There is a lot of rooting out of the Constitution to address the imbalances that have been described, but there is no justification in my view not to take the Bill as a positive.

The economy has been damaged significantly over the course of 2011 to 2015. It is in that context that we must welcome the Bill to give people an opportunity to start to engage with the shares of a recovery. That will require some method of engagement to ensure that there is a fair and equal distribution of the wealth from the economy. My criticism is that in the recent past we had a referendum which involved reducing the presidential age. What was the chance of ever looking at constitutionally progressing the imbalances in the relationship between the employer and employee, the master and the servant? It was a wasted opportunity as the Government made little or no effort with respect to the presidential age. That was born out of the Constitutional Convention. If there is to be a Constitutional Convention under a future Government, it is critical that the difficulties and hurdles to the utopian view of collective bargaining are first addressed in a referendum to decide what the balance of the relationship between an employee and an employer should be.

I have no doubt that if there had not been a change of leadership within the Labour Party, we would not be speaking here today on collective bargaining. I am concerned, however, about the consequences of the delay. Where one has seen investment in the economy and jobs, a significant advantage has been given to enterprise with respect to competing and bottom-feeding at the bottom end of the economy. The result is that significant time has been created for some enterprises to circumvent the principles set out in the legislation. Where there is non-unionised employment, I have witnessed the construct of a staff representative council. How are we going to test how meaningful the substance of negotiations in an enterprise where the non-unionised structure of a staff representative council could end up negotiating whether it is to be fig rolls or Mikado biscuits or the content of the Christmas hamper? How do we establish what is meaningful in the context of pay and conditions in non-unionised employment? A significant opportunity has been afforded. It is a huge concession that was given by the Labour Party to the economy and the masters in government, Fine Gael.

I have no doubt that if the Minister of State, Deputy Nash, had not been appointed, we would not have this Bill in the House today. I have no doubt that Fine Gael has reluctantly given him what was Fianna Fáil legislation. Fianna Fáil legislation has been dusted down and copper-fastened by the Minister of State in relation to the three court challenges. The politics of this appears to be that a week ago, the Labour Party was hopped into selling Aer Lingus and needed a vivid demonstration for the backbenchers of Fine Gael of the justification for a registered employment agreement. That was the silver lining of the argument that justified the consensus on the sale of a State asset. If that is what it takes, the Minister of State must reflect on the people he is in government with. The Government sold the State share in Aer Lingus for €320 million. It was only last Thursday that the Taoiseach was describing the Opposition as hysterical with respect to the raising of issues around discounts of €1 billion for top companies which have, again, had an opportunity to bottom-feed.

The Government has come out worse politically on this, but that does not detract from the Minister of State's own role in getting it to this juncture. We are all entitled in this House to have an opinion and to make an analysis, but this should not distract us from what is good about this legislation. I am convinced that if the leadership of the Labour Party had not changed the Minister of State would not be sitting here today, but that is the end of the Labour Party in government; it is over. That is the last commitment the party had in the programme for Government and it took them four and a half years to get to this juncture. It has resulted, in my view, in significant concessions. I refer to that virtuous blind eye by which Labour has turned its back on things when it was needed most. This legislation was needed four years ago. That is the criticism I have.

I refer to the consequences of the delay in accelerating critical legislation. When one looks at the composition, the structure and the procedures in the legislation, one can see that this is Fianna Fáil legislation which has been dusted down and copperfastened with respect to the role of the Attorney General and the three challenges to the constitutionality of the previous legislation, including Aer Lingus and the fast food industry. That is a pretty poor legacy after four and a half years, and the consequences for the workplace have been significant. It would be wrong to reject the legislation because of the politics of the situation. It would be short-sighted of people in this House not to accept it as a stepping stone towards normality and harmonious relationships in the workplace. We anticipate that there will be some recovery in the economy, which will be a real recovery. In those circumstances we need to see a formal mechanism by which workers, trade unions and staff representative councils - preferably unions - could have an opportunity for meaningful engagement. However, the vacuum created for four and a half years is an issue of legacy politics because much of the investment that has taken place has been on the basis of circumventing the legislation, hand-picking a staff representative council and a negotiating team and deciding the agenda. I want assurances from the Minister of State that there will be a real test with respect to non-unionised employments with regard to efforts to provide for a staff representative council. There has to be some element of testing the real gains that are made by non-unionised staff representative councils, as opposed to the proxy organisation of a union in unionised employment, where terms and conditions of employment are less than in the unionised employment. That is the test - whether the terms and conditions in, for example, a non-unionised hotel are less favourable than in a unionised hotel. What is the mechanism to ensure that a staff representative council is meaningful in terms of pay, conditions, pension provisions and health and safety regulations and that people are not acting in bad faith to superficially comply with the spirit of the legislation? I do not see that copperfastened in the legislation, but it would be wrong of people to ideologically kick the Government on this.

The legislation is as good as it can be because the groundwork was done prior to this point. My only reservation is that it is four and a half years late. I am pretty confident it would not have happened if the Minister of State were not there, but these are the benefits of getting rid of the last leader of the Labour Party.

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